European Union enlargement: A Euro Babel in waiting?

European Union enlargement: A Euro Babel in waiting?

By Joe L. Spartz

JAKARTA (JP): Following the recently concluded European Union
summit meeting in Helsinki, the official list of new member
candidates, including Turkey, has now been extended to 13 which
could ultimately increase EU member countries from 15 to 28.

Subject to meeting strict EU admission conditions, a first
intake of new members over the next three to five years could
include Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Cyprus, Slovenia and
Estonia.

A second batch of new member candidates with whom detailed
admission conditions are to be negotiated starting next February
would include Lithuania, Latvia, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Rumania,
Malta and Turkey.

Sooner or later, other European countries such as Croatia,
Bosnia, Serbia, Montenegro, Macedonia, Albania, and why not
Kosovo, can be expected to seek admittance.

Even after excluding other European countries such as Iceland,
Norway, Ukraine or Belarus, the European Union may ultimately
include some 35 countries, a feat which not even Napoleon could
have conceived in his wildest dreams.

While the proposed EU enlargement is hailed by political
leaders and eurocrats alike as a momentous milestone in the
history of Europe, its full impact and consequences still need to
be fully understood by the citizens of the existing member states
and who, rather undemocratically, were not even consulted in the
first place.

Translating a monumental political decision into acceptable
and workable realities will be a herculean task for which
existing EU institutions are not prepared or are insufficiently
prepared and the proposed EU enlargement may very well contain
the seeds of its own implosion or disintegration.

Absorbing a dozen or so economically underdeveloped and
ethnically diverse new members would be outright utopian and
render the EU, already beset by "subsidiarity" related
exceptions, national veto rights, high unemployment, lack of
fiscal harmonization, a yet to be fully implemented euro currency
or a disastrous agricultural policy, virtually unmanageable.

Astronomical agricultural and structural development subsidies
alone, not to mention an unprecedented influx of cheap labor
would not only overtax the EU's resources but also place an
impossible burden on its cumbersome, inefficient and often
wasteful bureaucratic and political institutions.

One does not have to be a "euroskeptic" to seriously question
the direction in which the EU is headed or whether this will be
the end of a Europe as we know it.

To start with, the free and unhindered movement of people
within an enlarged union will in all likelihood open the
floodgates for untold millions, seeking employment or simply a
better life in existing member countries already beset by serious
unemployment problems.

Countries such as France or Germany have so far not been able
to fully integrate existing ethnic minorities and a further
influx beyond a certain limit will inevitable strengthen already
well entrenched nationalistic feelings and xenophobic
resentments.

Fears that an enlarged EU would dilute Europe's identity and
cohesiveness have already been voiced by no less than the
president of the European Parliament, Nicole Fontaine, and even
Romano Prodi, the commission's president, now concedes that there
is a need for public debate as to where the frontiers of Europe
should lie.

A case in point would be Turkey with less than 5 percent of
its territory situated in Europe and whose candidature was rather
reluctantly and following an earlier refusal accepted for
strictly political reasons.

An enlarged EU will definitely affect the daily lives of all
citizens in the existing member countries and the sad fact
remains that neither national politicians nor unelected eurocrats
have thought it necessary to seek their assent prior to
committing Europe's future.

If the proposed EU enlargement, together with a realistic
assessment of its impact and related costs had been put to a
vote, a massive rejection could have been expected.

A first obstacle to overcome by an enlarged EU would
definitely be the problem of communication amid a Babel of
languages.

With an official 11 national languages already to cope with,
the translation of mountains of documents or endless meetings and
sessions has already reached nightmarish proportions.

With almost 2,000 full-time translators and interpreters as
compared to only 400 or so for the entire 185 member United
Nations, the European Union already maintains the largest
translation staff in the world.

Including logistics and support staff, the EU's language
service employs almost 4,000 people or more than 10 percent of
its entire personnel and it is anybody's guess by how much this
would further increase by the addition of new member countries.

Unless a single language such as English can be adopted as the
sole lingua franca, a Babel of languages may ultimately turn out
to be the grain of sand that brought an enlarged EU engine to a
standstill.

Another major problem would be the implementation of a
workable decision-making process and in which the national
interests of dissenting countries would be sufficiently
considered.

As evidenced by Britain's recent rejection of a 20 percent tax
on savings and investment, key EU legislation can be easily
derailed by any one country using its national veto right.

Veto rights were originally intended to safeguard and protect
each member country's vested national interests.

These, however, would need to be abolished and replaced by a
simplified majority voting system if policy decisions by an
enlarged EU membership were to be made possible but which as a
result may cause unwanted legislation to be imposed on minority
voting member countries.

Other consequences of an enlarged EU in terms of political,
economic, social and financial costs, not to mention difficult to
reconcile ethnic and cultural differences, still remain to be
assessed and explained in detail by European politicians to their
respective electorates.

In order to qualify for EU membership and to meet EU's strict
admittance criteria, significant and often painful reforms have
been undertaken by new member candidates.

Irrespective of reforms achieved, however, huge gaps in terms
of economic infrastructure and development or standards of living
and income levels will persist.

Economic restructuring and development costs necessary to give
newcomers at least a fighting chance against unbridled
competition from developed western member countries will be
astronomical and a significant portion of funds required would
have to be provided by already heavily strained EU development
budgets.

If the German reunification experience is anything to go by, a
far-reaching and painful dismantlement of inefficient industries
and business entities will be unavoidable with increased
unemployment and hardships for years to come.

Another important question is how a future enlarged EU is to
be managed.

To start with, the size of the existing European Parliament
would have to be adjusted in order to accommodate new members and
national voting rights would have to be brought into line with
existing realities.

Germany's voting rights for instance are only five times those
of Luxembourg and significantly reduced voting rights would need
to be imposed on smaller member countries.

Over the years, EU institutions and bureaucracies have churned
out countless rules, regulations or guidelines which in many
instances would not be applicable or implementable in new member
countries.

EU bureaucracies have often been ridiculed in the past for
inane regulations such as the standardization of tomatoes and
cucumbers or common norms for lawn mowers, but the fact remains
that an in-depth clearing and weeding out of the EU legislative
jungle should be a priority.

Managing an enlarged EU with a population of up to half a
billion people will be a formidable task which existing
institutions and bureaucracies cannot be expected to cope with
without a complete top-to-bottom overhaul and reorganization.

Bureaucratic euromonsters, feeding on itself or institutions
riddled with political appointees and entrenched eurocrats would
need to be reassessed in accordance with basic management
criteria applicable to business corporations such as competence
and professionalism and reorganized as necessary from ground up.

By opening EU admission gates to large numbers of economically
backward and ethnically diverse countries, not all candidates can
be expected to make the grade and an indefinite delaying or
refusal of admission could possibly lead to political instability
and other problems in the countries concerned.

Countries who do make the grade, however, cannot expect
miracles overnight or to ignore sacrifices to be made.

A gradual admission system in which full EU membership would
be granted in stages only may have been a more realistic
alternative for all parties concerned or avoided some of the
indigestion following the EU political expansion bulimia.

Last but not least, an EU enlargement with far-reaching and
still to be assessed consequences should be decided by the people
concerned and not over their heads by politicians who may no
longer be around when the curtain finally comes down.

The writer is a business consultant based in Jakarta.